Worldbuilding 205: Assimilation
Greetings and sitar! Well, I am completely tone-deaf... Honestly, I am just terrible at music beyond knowing what I like and don’t like. Anyway, HI! Today, we talk about assimilation, and not the Borg style. But with it, official disclaimer.
Disclaimer: Every culture has something valuable to provide to the world and every cultural practice that does not involve harming a person, people, or groups, is equally valid. Purposeful eradication of culture, even if the humans remain, is a form of genocide and morally abhorrent. We at Stellima do not in any way condone any practice that results in the loss of culture or history that is not the free choice of the people themselves, absent of any form of coercion, and even with this freedom, any loss of culture and history is a loss to all of humanity and makes the human existence poorer in its diversity.
Different cultures good, don’t harm people, we get that and all is well, alright? MOVING ON!
Definition
What would a blogpost with little old me be without a good definition section? Keep in mind, as usual, this is my definition and what I find to be more useful for worldbuilding purposes and may not reflect definitions used for the real world. I try to do broad strokes that cover many bases to capture the even richer nature imagination allows us.
Cultural assimilation, or just assimilation, is when one culture, through changes in customs, practices, values, or language, becomes more similar to or entirely identical to another culture.
Many say that it has to be a so-called dominant culture, which is fair; it often is. But I want it to be as broad as possible to allow anyone to go any direction they want and even allow for the concept of partial assimilation, where a culture moves in a direction to be more similar to another while never going the full distance.
Another important part that I will come back to is individuals. One individual matching, or even one family, is not here assimilation because one can have many reasons to abandon one's own culture. But I will get back to this.
Coerced assimilation
This is the one that is the most infamous and most often the most heinous, so let’s start with a bummer so we can get to the more happy go time stuff, yes?
This is essentially when one culture and people come in and try to stomp out another culture through very harsh means. If you don’t do it in very cruel manners, it is not coerced, and we will get to that type in a little bit. But first of all, why would anyone want to violently coerce other people to be like them?
A classical reason, which is absolutely horrendous, is a belief in cultural superiority. This one has been popular through colonialism. Colonialism does not need to involve any form of assimilation, but it often will involve assimilation. But through colonialism, a lot of beliefs of one's own cultural superiority popped up, at least if you were the colonisers. It seemed reasonable; why would they be so easily conquered if you weren’t superior culturally?
Not like there are many reasons why technological development can go in many directions and even grind to a halt. Sure, some things are cultural, and certain cultural practices do lend themselves to more conquest and the like. If your culture is heavily focused on militarism and supporting the military, of course, you are going to have a military that is hard to beat. But that is basically because you are throwing a lot of money and work into the military, and unless your culture has rampant corruption, throwing money and work at anything will, over time, massively improve it.
So the “you think you are superior, you impose your culture because it is better" is one alternative. Again, only in their views, because with the exception of harming people, no culture is inherently better. Another reason why you might have coerced assimilation is to unify people. If you control 200 different cultures in your empire, they will first and foremost be loyal to their culture; you are probably not in the top 5 of things they are primarily loyal to. But if you can reduce this to 10 cultures or even just one culture, now you are all one people, and it is easier to have the entire population work as a whole with you, the ruling class, as their leaders. All it takes is a lot of diplo mana and time.
And by diplo mana, an EUIV game reference, I mean you punish any old practices severely, reward snitches, take any children and make sure they grow up in your culture before they can return, install leaders of your own culture locally, reward local leaders for being like your culture, and destroy books, scrolls, statues, buildings, anything that can tie people back to the other culture you want gone.
Would it come as a surprise that this was done by the Chinese in their early unification wars? Probably not; as I always have said, people are bastard coated bastards with bastard filling in history, and other cultures have done the same. The Chinese were so efficient in the past that we only just barely know of the existence of what they did.
So yeah, nasty, but hey, it is good for the story and did and does happen in reality! I do know someone who has it in her book 👀
Encouraged assimilation
This one is considerably nicer. As the name suggests, this one is not forced, only encouraged. But if you don’t care enough to be harsh in your assimilation, why would you still want to make people assimilate? Well, we still have the whole “My culture is better than yours, barbarian” thing. Fun fact, “barbarian” comes from Latin because they thought Germanic tribes sounded like they said “bar bar bar bar.” Plot twist, they were just going around asking for a bar to drink at.
Another reason for being encouraged instead of coerced is the whole “it is easier to rule people of the same culture because they all feel like they belong to the same group” thing. It is easier to get along with someone who celebrates the same holidays, holds the same values, believes in the same deities, etc, than someone who doesn't. Of course, in pluralistic societies, the name of the game is to not be similar, but no matter how pluralistic you are, you will have an easier time with people with similar values and all.
So yeah, it still benefits if you are going to reign an empire. The difference is that you, as an empire, have some semblance of common sense and know that if you go in and start demanding people do as you say, they will hate you and start to actively resist you. That is also why if you do coerced assimilation, you are going to need a big army, a strong army. And that costs a lot of money, money you can spend on other things! LIKE MORE CONQUEST!
Always do conquest; who has ever cared about self-determination? Oh yeah, I am doing a blog, anyway. So yeah, you are smarter than people trying to suppress others, so you figure if you are kinder, you can spend less money on beating people into the ground. The wise know angry people are troublesome.
So, how do you go about encouraging assimilation? Well, let’s be honest, it will always be there. Primarily because the dominant culture will always have a privileged position, and no matter how kind and good people are, the ones in the more privileged position will have it better, if ever so slightly, than the rest, and people will seek what makes their lives better, so drifting toward the dominant culture is desirable.
But what if you want to be more intentional? Well… make that discrepancy wider between your culture and their culture. Not too wide, though! If it is too wide, people get mad, and we are back to stomping down rebellions. Another one is, of course, just to give them a lot of bonuses if they do things. Bonuses even natives to your cultures don’t get! A little extra doesn’t hurt, right?
Like in my Divine Dominion, they do have a state religion, but you are free to believe exactly anything you want at any time, and the state or church (which really are the same) won’t come for you! But if you are of the faith, you have a little less taxes to pay. Enough that it is slightly enticing to join the club but not so high that anyone who really wants their faith won’t get too mad.
So, if you want to encourage assimilation, think of ways to make joining your club seem like a good option to gain things rather than staying. Historically, the Romans used this method. Another method is also to have the local ruling class just be of your culture. The ruling class is often looked up to and will be mimicked in a lot of ways just to be like them and ”fine and proper.”
Voluntary assimilation
Alright, maybe you aren’t even going to bother trying to encourage it; just let time take it where it goes, and after all, you’re a pluralistic good society that doesn't really care anyway. So all is well, and… What’s this? 😯 People are STILL assimilating; why is this happening!?
Same reasons as mentioned prior: privileged groups have a lot of benefits in culture even if nothing is explicit in the law. They will have benefits, and people want those benefits. And if all it takes is slight nudges of cultures, they will do it. In some ways, they will do a lot more than this, especially for their children.
There is an observed phenomenon all over the world where immigrants refuse to teach their children their native language, so the child only grows up knowing the local dominant language, which will definitely help them fit in with the local culture more. But it causes the obvious issue of having the next generation entirely cut off from their family history and whatever family doesn’t speak the local dominant language.
On a more lighthearted note, there is assimilation, partial at least, toward just popular cultures. We all know anime fans love Japanese culture and assimilate slightly toward it. So the dominant culture, because of some part of a culture, starts assimilating part of that other culture into itself. This is in contrast to cultural appropriation, which I won’t go into detail about now, but ANNE! ADD IT TO THE LIST! Anyway, the short version of it is that if the dominant culture appreciates another part of another culture and incorporates it while understanding it, it is a form of assimilation here. If it is just trying to get something good and cool without understanding any of the context of the other culture and causing harm toward said culture, it is appropriation. Roughly speaking.
But as tragic as any cultural loss is, that is something that is part of history and how reality is. Lots of cultures have been lost by the culture’s own will, and that has to be allowed. Unless you want to write a big baddy, then have them force it!
Assimilation and scale
And when it comes to anything, there is the question of scale. Some things are easier done at a large scale (rare, though), others are easier at a small scale (common), and assimilation is no different. One individual assimilation is trivial; it happens all the time. Enormously huge cultures technically never get assimilated into another. And it should be obvious why, as I discuss in my democracy post, getting a whole lot of people to agree on something new is a lot harder than getting people to agree on something that already is and they grow up in. Not impossible, but very difficult.
This is another reason why dominant cultures tend to be the assimilators while minority cultures tend to be the assimilated. Well, it is one of many factors that I have discussed. What larger cultures tend to do, on the other hand, is fragment. As stated, large numbers of people tend to be hard to get to agree on anything, so even here, it is hard. Sure, large broad strokes agreement can exist, but with any details, there will be disagreement. This is a contribution to the fact that any culture will have subcultures, and these subcultures can more easily splinter off into entirely different cultures, given time and isolation, and then be assimilated into another.
So, when doing assimilation, think a lot about the scale itself. The smaller the group you are trying to assimilate, the easier it is in the world. A very large culture has the group memory and numbers to resist almost anything, but a small group doesn’t have the same kind of strength in numbers to withstand all that is needed. Trying to get a culture of millions or billions to conform is a monumental task that will likely not be worth doing through coercion; encouragement and lots and lots of patience can work, however.
Assimilation through diversity
Wait, isn’t assimilation all about decreasing diversity? Well, yeah, it is… but that doesn’t mean you can’t use pre-existing diversity to reduce diversity. This is why I say that assimilation is about “partial” and not complete. Because it allows this section to exist. Think of yourself as a behemoth culture, and you want to assimilate in some aspect, let’s say religion. It is a very popular one historically, at least in Europe.
How do you get the ones of the wrong faith to join you? As stated here and in my culture post, people vehemently oppose being called wrong, told to not do what they want in their culture, and everything. How do you deal with this? Oh, I know, you have your religion diverse enough in some aspects that when you come to a region, you always have something you can use! Think of it like Catholic saints and old polytheisms in Europe. It is easier to assimilate people if you come and say, “Hey, we believe in the same being as you, we just call it a saint instead, and their name is X, but it is totally your Y!” than if you force them to abandon their beliefs and only accept the Christian god.
Mind you, this is a lot of how it was done in the early days to spread. Modern Christmas comes a lot from pagan beliefs and celebrations of winter solstice but was taken into the dominant culture (Christian) in order to assimilate the other cultures (Pagans). So your own pre-existing diversity can easily turn into an asset to work in encouraging assimilation or even do voluntary assimilation. Those two can easily co-exist as assimilation methods.
Mini-practicum
So, let’s do a bit of a mini-practicum. I have talked about my Limaces, a juggernaut of a people with an ecumenopolis as their homeworld. So you can imagine that as a culture, they are unrivaled, and within the Divine Dominion, they are the de facto dominant culture. They are also a highly religious people, so how do they do assimilation?
Obviously, being one of my beloved species, they are not going to do coerced assimilation. That goes against their religion and their views. But let’s be honest, are there some rotten eggs that will do it anyway and abuse any position of power in the Dominion? Of course, but we are not talking about exceptions; we are talking about the rule.
The first way they do it is a tax burden on the ones not in one of the many Limacism denominations. Horrible, is it? About 1% extra, so if you pay 30% in taxes, you have to pay…30.3% in taxes! THE HORROR! And yes, it is 30.3%, not 31%, because I said percent, not percentile. It is miniscule, but it does encourage conversion ever so slightly. But mostly, it doesn’t piss people off because whether of the faith or not, you get help, education, welfare, healthcare, and everything needed; it’s just a small thing that shows up on your taxes to remind you that you could convert and not see it anymore.
Another is the whole assimilation through diversity. Their religion, Limacism, is really forgiving when it comes to practice and details. It really holds only a few things that you must uphold. For one, Divinum is the supreme entity, called an urgod, in order to distinguish Zhim (Divinum) from other gods. Another is a great focus on life itself.
That offers a great deal of variety, and that is why there are hundreds of denominations, even though it is all governed by a single central church. The Ecclesiarchy, as it is called, does dictate what are valid denominations, but as long as those central tenets are upheld and you don’t go into territories that they oppose–we are talking dark stuff, then–your denomination will be approved.
So when they have gone to new worlds to add or have gotten them into the Dominion, they can easily present a denomination, or variant of Limacism, that is more palatable to the locals. If they are polytheistic, there are those too; if there are those who prefer more saints, there are denominations for that as well, or just a pure monotheistic religion, well, that exists too. They use the fact that they cannot have a coherent single religion in a star empire, which forces them to allow variety in denominations, as a method to incorporate more people into their religion. They use their own forced diversity to assimilate more people in the one aspect they remotely care about.
Do they force it on new ones? Of course not, but they heavily encourage it and have centuries of experience dealing with new contact, how to make the deal so sweet and alluring that cultures want to adopt Limacism as a religion. So a bit of psychological manipulation as well, but hey, just because they are my faves and precious creations doesn't mean they are all good! Just mostly good; I don’t believe in saints. The difference between an angel and a devil is that the devil doesn’t lie. Or, as Sisko said from Star Trek Deep Space 9:
It is easy to be a saint in paradise.
Summa summarum
Again, assimilation is a fact of life, but any loss of culture that is not harmful to people is a loss for all.
But the important thing to think about is that scale is important; larger cultures tend to have to fracture before they can be assimilated, and smaller cultures tend to be more assimilated. And when you do decide on a method, what purpose does it serve? A smart people will not go for coerced unless they have the force to do it fast, as a prolonged coerced assimilation is going to get expensive fast as it can essentially turn into a revolution or civil war.
And even if you have a pluralistic society that encourages all kinds of cultures, be aware that assimilation will still happen, and it can be happening in many directions. This is on top of the natural fragmentation of culture. How many times have you seen where the larger culture adopts something from a subculture? That is a form of assimilation, not much and it can be negative, but it is in our definition.
So assimilation is part of cultures interacting with each other just as much as it is about power, interest, and much else. So if you include it, be wise about it and think about how your culture will view it and want it to be done, if at all.
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Copyright ©️ 2025 Vivian Sayan. Original ideas belong to the respective authors. Generic concepts such as assimilation, its types, and the reasoning behind it are copyrighted under Creative Commons with attribution, and any derivatives must also be Creative Commons. However, specific ideas such as Limaces, Limacism, Divinum, and everything related to the Stellima universe as well as all language or exact phrasing are individually copyrighted by the respective authors. Contact them for information on usage and questions if uncertain what falls under Creative Commons. We’re almost always happy to give permission. Please contact the authors through this website’s contact page.
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